There are a colossal number of tones onboard the GW8. Sometimes it seems like an embarrassment of riches, and it took me over four hours to just audition them! With 892 tones, plus 256 GM2 tones and the World collection, you may find the days fly past just seeing what's on offer. All in all, they're a mixed bunch. If you already know the current range of Roland sounds, you'll be familiar with what to expect and need no further prompting. Many of the sound's parameters are controllable via velocity, although you may need to play very precisely to avoid unwanted results. The good news is that the classic synth sounds and pads of yore are here in abundance, and for any synth aficionado you can have great fun 'synth spotting'. In some ways this is a mobile museum of synth history, with classic analogue tones from past decades, some uncannily accurate emulations of Wavestation and Morpheus sounds, and multi-faceted textures that immediately inspire you to play.
The drum kits are excellent and vibrant throughout, as are the electric guitars, while the basses are good. However, it's not all good news on the sound front. Firstly, there seem to be quite a few duplications in instrument collections, with little — if any — perceivable difference between them. Some of the acoustic sounds lack focus and seem to be either over-processed or lacking accuracy to me. Some acoustic guitars are a bit clunky and the church organ is rather wimpy, while the baritone sax lacks depth and body. As always with instruments of this nature, some sounds bear little relationship to their names — the ukelele is identical to the acoustic guitar (likewise the mandolin), the recorder is nothing of the sort, and the orchestral instruments are a very mixed bag, from the OK to the clunky. The strangest ones are some of the (claimed) vocal sounds, which, to my ears, have a string pad mixed in (why?). And the Mellotron emulations will make Melly fans apoplectic with rage at the out-of-tune and knackered nature of the tone.
